


Tick, Tick, Boom

by Kit



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett, Dresden Files - Jim Butcher
Genre: Crossover, Crossover Pairing, F/M, Gift Fic, mostrous regiment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-11
Updated: 2010-12-11
Packaged: 2017-10-13 14:59:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/138621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kit/pseuds/Kit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>“Mac,” said the woman, in a voice that was slightly British. A blur of South African? All crystalline consonants and afterthought vowels. “A steak sandwich, please? Raw. No need for bread.”</em></p><p><em>Ick.</em> -- Harry meets a stranger.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tick, Tick, Boom

The vampires walked into the bar, and something went boom.

  
And no. I had nothing to do with it.

Really.

There was no fire to this, no crackling heat buckling at the careful asymmetry of McAnally’s walls.

There was just a strange countdown. _“Three. Two. Vun—_ vait _for the dicky-bird!...”_

And _boom_.

Dust trickled down in a small cone in Mac’s doorway, and a label fluttered down to join the mess, caught up at the last minute by the slight, shirt-haired figure standing behind it, who was wearing a coat that rivalled my own. Almost. Even I have to admit that military, worn properly, has _style_.

“Mac,” said the woman, in a voice that was slightly British. A blur of South African? All crystalline consonants and afterthought vowels. “A steak sandwich, please? Raw. No need for bread.”

Ick.

Mac, who probably taught the Spartans about being laconic, back in the day, nodded and turned towards his icebox, seemingly unruffled by the military regalia, or the dust, or the black tripod scaffolding that was obscuring his door. Oh, and he didn’t seem to care about her teeth, either. Those were fangs that made the Red Court look like they’d gone downscale on the dental plan. She started folding up the legs of the tripod, the joins coming in like some giant, dying insect with canvas wings.

She was leaning on the bar in time for Mac to show up with her steak, which she... _threw_ , with worrying accuracy, to the pile of ashes on the pub’s floor. I stared hard as they coalesced, and then another slight figure, a man this time in an honest-to-God _waistcoat_ and tiny sunglasses from the time of John Lennon, was wiping his fingers absently on a large pocket handkerchief.

“Ah, yes!” he chirped. “Very nice, thank you. Good grain. But the substances in these places...I do not know _vhen_ you last cleaned this floor—or vhat vith.”

“You did want to see the local flavour, Otto,” said the uniform-vamp, shrugging. “It’s all here.” She nodded, smiling. “And a coffee, please?”

Mac looked pained.

When a vampire starts talking about flavour, I pretty much consider it my cue to get vocal. Besides, Mac’s floor was sacred ground. That last, though—that was what started me. Coffee in a pub. Fucking tourists.

“Look, Miss Transylvania, I don’t know what you’re expecting here, but—“

“Borogravia, actually.” She smirked. “And it’s corporal.”

“Say-what?”

A sigh. “Yes, yes. I know. Woman. Trousers. Womanly bits covered by trousers, disguised by socks. Very shocking.”

I blinked at her. She reached over and took the coffee—blacker than sin, spilling into the plate Mac had unceremoniously slammed beneath it. She drank it down with every sign of enjoyment—every _serious_ sign of enjoyment; the sort of signs people usually keep behind closed doors or sell at the back of drugstores next to the automotive magazines. She swallowed...well. She just _swallowed_ , all right? And I had no idea what she was talking about with the socks.

“Corporal Maladict,” she said, saluting in a way that made me look like I was just _bursting_ with zeal at every Warden gathering. “You seem like _trouble_.”

“I can be.” There was something wrong about this vamp.

“I doubt you’re the sort I like,” she said easily, shifting onto the stool next to me while her Mad Professor companion peered around the place muttering, I think, about eels. “But that’s an excellent coat, and the coffee here is...” she closed her eyes. “Well, you certainly know better than to make it in an old boot.” Her tongue flicked, briefly, over her lips, cleaning a stain, and I knew, just that way I do, that it was going to be a very long evening.

 


End file.
